Chairman of selectors Arnold Manders fears it could be too late to make any major changes to the national team with only three months until the World Cup — despite coach Gus Logie’s explicit threat to that effect this week.

In a departure from his usual reserved self, after Bermuda’s sixth-straight One-Day International defeat on Wednesday at the hands of regional rivals Canada, a clearly distraught Logie said heads may have to roll if this alarming slump in form was to be reversed.

“We’ll have to look at other players, there’s no two ways about it,” the Trinidadian said.

“If this is what we have to offer after so much work has been put in...so much preparation... if this is all we have to show for it, well it’s very difficult.”

Admittedly without having witnessed the latest debacle in southern Africa, yesterday Manders said that such was the thinness of genuine cricketing talent on the Island, he did not believe the selectors had too many alternatives at their disposal.

There was no doubt the team were tired, dispirited and in the middle of a bad patch of form, Manders added, but he insisted that the selectors had no choice but to stick with them through thick and thin.

“I can understand why Gus is frustrated,” the former Western Stars stalwart said. “I know as a coach how incredibly frustrating it is when you’ve done all the preparation and all the hard work and then the team goes out on the field and makes the same mistakes time and time again.

“But as for big changes in selection, I really don’t see that happening at this stage, though obviously we’ll have to sit down with Gus when he gets back and discuss the whole situation in more detail.

“We cannot kid ourselves though. Unlike many other countries, including the likes of Canada, Holland and Kenya, we only have around 20 players at most to pick from, so our options are pretty limited as to what we can do.

“There might be room for one or two changes, but in general we are going to have to pick those that have stuck with the programme since the very beginning.”

While Bermuda’s seam bowling attack in both Kenya and South Africa has been weakened by injuries to the likes of Kevin Hurdle and Ryan Steede, it’s the brittle nature of the batting that has been at the root of their current woes.

Bermuda have batted first in all six of their ODIs in Africa but have not once scored in excess of 250 even with the addition of David Hemp and the return to fitness of Clay Smith.

As long as the top order fails to fire, there will still be some who champion the cause of veteran left-hander Charlie Marshall — last season’s highest domestic run scorer.

When pressed on this issue, however, Manders was unequivocal.

“The batting has not been firing, but as far as Charlie is concerned it’s unlikely to happen,” he said.

“He’s been out of the team for around two years now and he suddenly made it known only a few months to go before the World Cup that he wants to get back involved. It’s too late.

“What you’ve got to remember is that it is not just about the World Cup — we’ve got to re-qualify again in 2009 and to pick Charlie at this stage would not be sensible with that in mind. He’s one year younger than me — it’s time to move on and give the younger players every opportunity to prove themselves.

“The guys are going through a rough time at the moment. But that’s the price you have to pay for success sometimes. We qualified for the World Cup which was a fantastic achievement, but we do not have the number or type of players who are capable of performing consistently well at that level.”